Am Montag, 12. September 2005 17:03 schrieb Dave Phillips: > Greetings: > > While I was working on the JACK article I was reminded how much I rely > on is Rui Capela's QJackCtl. I haven't touched JACK at the command-line > in a long while, thanks to QJC. > > So I was thinking about the complexity of configuring ALSA and I > started wondering what I'd want to see in a more complete ALSA > configuration utility. I'm just rambling out loud here, so feel free to > add and comment: > > 1) A soundcard configuration utility that would install multiple > drivers in a single pass, order and reorder devices as you wish, and > provide useful help regarding module options. This utility would bundle > the edit jobs for modules.conf and supply the information from modinfo. > Optimally the modinfo output could be made selectable for instant > addition to the configuration. [Add relevant info here for doing the > same with the 2.6 modules system] > > 2) An auto-generated .asoundrc, based on the capabilities of your > cards and chipsets, and a facility for editing, saving and deleting that > file. The editor should provide examples and explanations for the > possible additions to .asoundrc. > > 3) Built-in utilities for IRQ ordering and other hardware > optimizations. > > 4) A panel for a built-in mixer or facility to select a mixer, with > a store/restore interface to alsactl. Ideally the built-in mixer would > handle *any* soundcard supported by ALSA. > > 5) Start/stop/restart ALSA from the utility. > > 6) GUI for ALSA sequencer client connections. > > 7) Integrated loaders for soundfonts and other patches. > > 8) Display and control of ALSA's MIDI resources e.g. aseqnet, amidi, > > Tooltips and other help should be available for every option and every > part of the configurator to make the setup easy and quick. > > I realize that this utility could get rather big. Perhaps something > resembling xine's "level of mastery" could be added to divide the > utility into basic and advanced configuration panels ? > > I think ALSA is a great system, but fully understanding it is > non-trivial, and its variety makes it difficult for a normal user to > "see" the whole system. QJC envelopes JACK and its possibilities in such > a way that it's often ready to rock at its defaults, and it makes it > easy to further configure the server if necessary. Certainly something > similar could happen for ALSA, yes ? A QAlsaCtl maybe ? > > One problem: How to resist the temptation to refer to its acronym as > "quack"... > > Best, > > dp Do you know kasound? I think it's a good start for point 2) http://sourceforge.net/projects/kasound/ Best regards, Martin
